Neeskens’ Corner (Part 1)
Head Coach, Johan Neeskens sits down with Sundownsfc.com in a new feature called: Neeskens’ Corner, where the Dutch born mentor speaks on the past and upcoming matches, communicates his plans to the Mamelodi Sundowns supporters and speaks his mind on matters making rounds in the media.

On part 1 of his first feature Neeskens looks at the past two matches against Black Leopards and Platinum Stars, looks at the injury list and discusses the replacements’ contribution in the team’s performance thus far.

Black Leopards:

"If your team wins a home game by 5-1, it’s a good result that as a coach you can only be happy with because your team scored five goals and you don’t have a scoring problem," explains Coach Neeskens.

Johan Neeskens also mentioned that his side could have added to the score line when one considers the number of chances Sundowns had in that particular match, but was also quick to point out that the team is working hard at the training grounds to improve in areas such as the taking of chances and punishing the opponents when they make mistakes at the back.

Platinum Stars:

“Platinum Stars have a stronger squad compared to Black Leopards and they have a totally different style of playing from us. It’s not easy to play against them, because they get the ball upfront very quickly and utilize their big strong forwards quite well.”

“Overall this was a crazy game, it could have ended 2-2 or 3-3, but I was not happy with a lot of things and that is what I’m going to address with my players. We were also not well organized in the in the back and in the midfield and the balance was not really there in my team, sometimes the players pushed forward too much even when we were still building up and at times they were defending too deep”.

“I think again we created a lot of chances and we didn’t convert them, but on the other hand we also gave away a lot of chances, due to lack of communication between the players”.

Injuries (Inj.) and Suspensions (Sus.):

Over the past couple of weeks ‘Bafana ba style’ have been rocked by injuries and suspensions to some of the key members of Neeskens squad such as:

Inj.: Ramahlwe Mphahlele – Quads Strain
Inj.: Doctor Mampuru – Quads Strain
Inj.: Clayton Daniels – Medial Collateral Ligament (MCL)
Inj.: Lebohang Mokoena – Lateral Collateral Ligament (LCL)

Sus.: Elias Pelembe – picked up three yellow cards

The team doctors have reported that skillful midfielder Lebohang Mokena and the defensive trio of Mphahlele, Mampuru and Daniels are all making good progress with their rehabilitation programs and most of them should recover in time for the next league match against Maritzburg United.

Elias Pelembe has already served his one match suspension against Platinum Stars and will also be available for the crucial league match, should he report back from the Mozambican national team injury free.

“At Mamelodi Sundowns we have a big pool of talented and capable players, when players are not available due to injury or suspension you have to look for other players that have been doing well at training and give them a run”.

“The players I have selected to replace the injured and suspended players have shown me that they really want to play by displaying a very good attitude and mental sharpness from the training grounds”.

Neeskens told Sundownsfc.com that he was pleased with the overall contribution of the replacements on the league matches they played so far and also added that everyone has a chance to play in his team.